The Sept. 26 article "Stores defend 24-hour operations" claims that some local government officials want to curb convenience stores' midnight operations to help combat global warming. Maybe there are more convenience stores than needed in Japan. But once again government officials prove their complete lack of any sense of proportion.
First of all, it would be much more reasonable to ban those outdoor vending machines that sell cold drinks in summer and hot drinks in winter. There are several million of those machines in Japan, and they often appear in clusters of five to 10. I read somewhere that the energy consumption of each machine is about 60 percent of the average household's. With convenience stores on every other street corner, what purpose do those vending machines serve?
How about introducing requirements on thermal insulation of homes? In some countries we require about 250 mm of thermal insulation in walls. In Japan, nothing. Thermal insulation not only keeps the cold out in winter; it also keeps the heat out in summer. And there are considerably more residential units in Japan than there are convenience stores.
It's about time that government officials were selected for their common sense and sense of proportion rather than for their ability to pass meaningless tests.
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